Author: Andres-Papazian

When misery is a legacy
Armenia shows what happens if a nation becomes trapped in the past and
cannot move on

Peter Preston
guardian.co.uk,
Sunday 19 September 2010 19.00 BST

Ece Temelkuran is brilliant and beautiful – but, above all, brave. You
have to be brave if you’re a Turkish journalist covering Armenia, with
genocide, cynicism, and truth shredded over 95 years. Temelkuran
writes about Yerevan and Ankara and mutual incomprehension, but she
could be writing about Cyprus, Kashmir, Korea, Israel; anywhere that
is locked in a timewarp of malign remembrance.

In 1915 Ottoman Turkey systematically killed or deported Armenians; an
act of genocide in which up to a million and a half people died. But
why does 1915 matter in 2010? It was the question that Temelkuran’s
murdered friend, the Armenian editor, Hrant Dink, asked, and the
question Temelkuran set out to answer. To those who live just over the
ludicrously sealed border from Turkey, it matters because that was
when the killing began and Armenians became another giant diaspora,
scattered from Los Angeles to Paris. It matters because Turkey’s still
unacknowledged responsibility for those mass murders binds the new,
utterly impoverished Armenian state together. It matters because the
French part of the diaspora has built an entire emotional theory of
nationhood on Ankara’s refusal to confront its past and just say
“sorry”. It matters in LA because genocide means reparations and
lawyers and zillions of dollars.

And it matters to us because understanding this distant but strangely
potent fury helps us understand something far beyond Ararat, the Deep
Mountain of Temelkuran’s recently published analysis. She’s explaining
something that the English in particular can barely comprehend.
History for us is a moribund, inert business. It doesn’t bring out
boiling passions. We’ve “moved on” so comprehensively that we don’t
quite recall where we came from.

The world in the shadow of Armenia’s deep mountain is different.
Sometimes it feels as though the slaughter was yesterday, not sealed
in the tales of grandmothers. Why are the stories that survive always
filled with pain, Temelkuran asks. Because pain and suffering endures
while happiness fades. Misery is halfway to myth. It unites; and,
alas, it deludes.

You see it in Cyprus when Greek Cypriots who weren’t born at the time
of Turkish occupation 40 years ago grieve for their lost homes in the
north. You feel it when you talk to Koreans about the cousins they’ve
never met across the 39th parallel. From the Holocaust museum in
Berlin to the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem, the past defines the future
of the Middle East.

“Remembering takes two,” Temelkuran writes. “If there’s no one to
remember with you, the things you remember never existed, never
happened, vanish. A nation can opt to forget en masse.” But equally a
land can have a memory, “made up not of the recollections of
individuals, but of the concerted efforts of a people who have decided
to remember”.

Armenia, a nation that has decided to remember, is important because
it is a template for passion preserved. You can travel the diaspora
and dissect its refusal to abandon the causes of 1915 (even though so
many ordinary people, interviewed alone, don’t really know what it’s
about any longer, or what would end it). But you can also, if you’re
wise, try to deconstruct this baffling legacy of leftover pain.

It isn’t about what happened in 1915. Nobody alive remembers that. But
it’s an instant, irresistible definition of what being Armenian means.
It explains, throughout the diaspora, why things are the way they are.
It seeks to conclude that nothing can change. And when, as last week,
I hear two of the wisest Israelis I know say quietly that, against all
odds, these peace talks will succeed, because “we are all so tired, so
weary for peace”, then the Ararat test is the one to set. Can Jews and
Arabs opt to forget en masse?

From: A. Papazian

Hurriyet Daily News, Turkey
Sept 19 2010

US panel to vote on Azerbaijan envoy

Sunday, September 19, 2010
Ã`MÄ°T ENGÄ°NSOY
ANKARA – Hürriyet Daily News

Bryza first appeared at his confirmation hearing at the Foreign
Relations Committee on July 22, but shortly later a pro-Armenian
senator delayed his confirmation vote. AP photo

The U.S. Senate’s Foreign Relations Committee is set to vote Tuesday
on President Barack Obama’s ambassadorial pick for the Azerbaijani
capital of Baku amid Armenian-Americans’ ongoing opposition to the
diplomat’s nomination.

The Armenian National Committee of America, or ANCA, the largest and
most influential Armenian-American group, accuses Matt Bryza of
denying what it calls the “Armenian genocide” and of having a
pro-Turkish and pro-Azerbaijani position.

The ANCA, in a weekend statement, urged Armenian-Americans “to call
your senators and urge them to reject Bryza’s nomination and to write
your senators and urge them to block the nomination.”

“Mr. Bryza, with every new dodge, digs himself a deeper and deeper
hole, demonstrating why he is so clearly the wrong choice to be U.S.
ambassador to Azerbaijan,” said Aram Hamparian, executive director of
the ANCA. “Our nation’s interests in Baku and throughout the Caucasus
would be best served by a fresh start, with a nominee that doesn’t
bring such baggage and bias to this important diplomatic posting.”

Bryza, who has been U.S. deputy assistant secretary of state for
European and Eurasian affairs since 2005, was nominated in May to
become the new U.S. ambassador to Azerbaijan, a position vacant since
last year.

Under U.S. laws all senior administration officials, including
ambassadors, need to be confirmed by the Senate. Ambassadorial
nominations first need the Senate Foreign Relations Committee’s
approval, and then they should be endorsed in a full Senate vote.

Bryza appeared at his confirmation hearing at the Foreign Relations
Committee on July 22, but shortly later pro-Armenian Sen. Barbara
Boxer, a Democrat from California, delayed his confirmation vote by
the committee until September. The committee members now will decide
Tuesday whether they endorse him or not.

But even if Bryza wins the committee’s approval, still any senator may
indefinitely block his nomination by placing a hold on his
confirmation.

Ankara envoy also awaits confirmation

Separately and for different reasons, Obama’s ambassadorial pick for
Ankara, Frank Ricciardone, also is still waiting for the completion of
his confirmation process in the Senate.

Obama on July 1 nominated Ricciardone, a former U.S. ambassador to
Egypt and the Philippines. Ricciardone, qualified by some foreign
policy experts as an “Arabist,” is planned to replace Jim Jeffrey in
Ankara. Jeffrey has become the new U.S. ambassador to Baghdad.

Ricciardone won the Senate Foreign Relations Committee’s backing on
July 22. But on the last day before the Senate went to a summer recess
in August, influential Republican Sen. Sam Brownback from Kansas
formally put a hold on his nomination, saying: “I am not convinced
Ambassador Ricciardone is the right ambassador for Turkey at this time
– despite his extensive diplomatic experience.”

In an Aug. 16 letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Brownback
was particularly critical of Ricciardone’s service in Egypt. “My
concerns about Ricciardone’s work … lead me to concerns about his
approach to a number of issues in our relationship with Turkey,” the
senator said.

“Over the last few years, secular opposition parties (in Turkey) have
complained that they received less access to the U.S. ambassador than
the ruling party, and based on his record to date, I am concerned that
this situation would not change under Ambassador Ricciardone,”
Brownback said.

“I believe we must be concerned that the Turkish government is moving
away from its secularist roots. Next year’s pivotal elections provide
an opportunity for the secularists to demonstrate their strength, and
we cannot let our desire for a strong bilateral relationship translate
into de facto support of the ruling party, especially if we have
reason to believe that opposition parties are in danger of being
marginalized,” he said.

Brownback then asked Clinton to provide him with information that
would remove his concerns. Clinton in late August provided him with
written answers.

Brownback, who will leave the Senate this fall as part of his quest to
become the Kansas governor, is expected this month to decide whether
or not to lift his hold on Ricciardone.

From: A. Papazian

Wall Street Journal , NY
Sept 19 2010

Barbara Boxer (D., Armenia)
The Democrat trashes an Obama nominee.

Spare a thought for Matthew Bryza, a Presidential appointee who is a
victim of election-year politics and parochial ethnic lobbies on
Capitol Hill.

Mr. Bryza is a highly accomplished career diplomat who has spent two
decades working on the Caucasus and Central Asia. In May, President
Obama nominated Mr. Bryza, a deputy assistant Secretary of State for
European and Eurasian affairs in the Bush years, to be U.S. ambassador
to Azerbaijan. He carries no partisan baggage, and you’d think he’d be
waved through the Senate. Yet his confirmation is in jeopardy thanks
to California Senator Barbara Boxer’s re-election woes.

The most vocal opposition to Mr. Bryza comes from the Armenian
National Committee of America, or ANCA. The influential lobby alleges
that Mr. Bryza is biased toward Azerbaijan and Turkey, Armenia’s
regional nemeses. As proof, they cite his marriage to Turkish-born
Zeyno Baran, a scholar on leave from the Hudson Institute. The ANCA
dredges up a few past comments by Mr. Bryza related to the dispute
between Armenia and Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh. The diplomat
co-chaired the Minsk Group, which is trying to broker peace between
the two sides.

These charges were addressed to the satisfaction of most Senators
during last month’s confirmation hearings. If anything, Ms. Baran is a
prominent critic of Turkey’s government who has published widely,
including in these pages. Mr. Bryza enjoys good relations with
politicians in Azerbaijan and Armenia, whose government doesn’t oppose
his nomination.

That Mr. Bryza is respected by all sides in this turbulent and
difficult region is a testament to his diplomatic skills. But he does
have a long track record – which most people would see as relevant
experience – that the hard line ANCA can use to fight him and, not
incidentally, gain attention for its fund raising.

Lucky for them, the three-term Senator Boxer is in danger of losing
her seat to Republican challenger Carly Fiorina. The Golden State is
home to a large Armenian community, a potential swing bloc this
November, and Ms. Boxer is pandering for their votes. Along with New
Jersey’s Senator Robert Menendez, who runs the Democratic Senatorial
Campaign Committee, she grilled Mr. Bryza in his hearing before the
Foreign Relations Committee. She then asked to “bounce” a committee
vote on him from last month to tomorrow.

The delay hurts his chances. Even if Mr. Bryza gets out of committee,
Ms. Boxer may put a hold on him to stop confirmation by unanimous
consent. It’s unlikely the full Senate could schedule a floor vote on
his nomination before the campaign recess. The White House has bigger
problems than to press an endangered Democratic incumbent on an
ambassadorial appointment, and it hasn’t.

Meantime, the ambassador’s office in Baku has been empty for 14
months. This suits the ANCA just fine. The Armenian lobby would love
to see America’s ties to the Turkic world weakened. Each year they
press Congress to adopt a resolution that the 1915 massacre of ethnic
Armenians at the hands of the Ottomans qualifies as a “genocide,”
infuriating Turkey.

These tribal Caucasian obsessions threaten U.S. interests. Oil-rich
and strategically located between Russia and Iran, Azerbaijan has
enjoyed close relations with Washington. Azeri leaders view the
absence of an ambassador as a symptom of recent American neglect, a
view reinforced by Senator Boxer’s typically political and
self-serving games.

From: A. Papazian

The National, UAE
Sept 19 2010

Armenians gather for first service in 95 years

Thomas Seibert, Foreign Correspondent
Last Updated: September 19. 2010 7:55PM UAE / September 19. 2010 3:55PM GMT

ISTANBUL // Church bells rang out on the island of Akdamar in eastern
Anatolia for the first time in 95 years yesterday as thousands of
Armenians from Turkey and other countries gathered for a historic
religious ceremony in a region that was a centre of Armenian life
until the massacres of the First World War.

`This is a positive step,’ Petros Boyacan, an Armenian cardiologist
from Syria, said in a telephone interview. He was speaking from
outside the Church of the Holy Cross on Akdamar in Lake Van near the
city of Van. `Tolerance is a very good thing. People are the same
everywhere.’

Live pictures from Turkish television stations showed a procession of
clergymen dressed in robes and carrying flags and candles filing into
the church that was built in the 10th century and rescued from decay
by a government-sponsored renovation programme five years ago.

`We are very happy,’ an Armenian woman from Istanbul told the Turkish
NTV news channel. The church could hold only a few dozen guests. Most
of the visitors followed the service from a square outside the
building.

The ceremony on Akdamar attracted about 3,000 guests, said Mustafa
Aladag, a lawyer in Van who organised an initiative to welcome the
Armenians. Most came from Istanbul and the south-eastern city of
Diyarbakir, but there were also Armenians from Armenia itself, as well
as from the United States, Europe, Iran and Syria. The church on
Akdamar is officially designated as a museum. But from now on,
Armenians will have permission to celebrate mass in the church once a
year.

`This is a very important development,’ Mr Aladag said about the mass.
`It is a step towards overcoming problems between Armenians, Kurds and
Turks.’

Coming just one week after Turks approved wide-ranging constitutional
reforms, the service on Akdamar marked another effort by Turkey to
strengthen basic rights, including religious freedom. Turkey is trying
to burnish its image in an effort to win admission to the European
Union.

The permission to hold the mass followed a similar church service for
Greek Orthodox Christians in an ancient monastery in north-eastern
Anatolia last month and was seen as a gesture by Ankara towards
Turkey’s Christian minorities.

Akdamar carries special significance for Kurds, Turks and Armenians.
The region around Van, predominantly Kurdish today, had a sizeable
Armenian population until the First World War. The Armenians were
killed or driven out and many atrocities were committed by both Turks
and Kurds. The situation in Van was different from other Anatolian
towns and cities, where hundreds of thousands of unarmed Armenian
civilians were killed or sent on death marches in 1915. In Van,
Armenian rebels also killed Turks and Kurds.

Relations between Turkey and Armenia are burdened by the memory of
what Armenia and many international scholars call the modern world’s
first genocide. Turkey rejects that term.

Last year, Turkey and Armenia signed protocols designed to pave the
way towards a normalisation of their relations, with an exchange of
ambassadors and the opening of their joint border, which has been
closed since the early 1990s. But the process has stalled.

Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey’s prime minister, said his government
hoped the gesture would help to kick start the difficult process of
rapprochement with Armenia. `The mass on Akdamar is a statement of our
world view,’ Mr Erdogan said last week. `I hope it will not remain
unanswered.’

Armenians in Van thanked Mr Erdogan for the gesture.

In Van, many people welcomed the Armenians. When a local newspaper
called on citizens to billet Armenian visitors because the city’s
hotels were fully booked, thousands signed up.

The event also was marked with a concert by the Turkish-born Armenian
pianist Sahan Arzruni on the eve of the mass.

Initially, about 5,000 people were expected in Van, but Armenian
community leaders say a row about whether a new cross would be fitted
to the church in time for the ceremony led to a boycott call by
several Armenian groups from outside Turkey who argued that a church
without a cross on the roof would not be complete. The cross will be
attached to the church at the end of the month, authorities have said.

Bishop Aram Atesyan, the acting head of the Armenian patriarchate in
Istanbul, told Turkish authorities in Van that the boycott had led to
a drop of visitors at the service. `We could not reach the figures
that we originally thought,’ the bishop said according to Turkish news
reports. Bishop Atesyan, the de facto spiritual leader of Turkey’s
Armenians because of an illness of Patriarch Mesrob II, conducted
yesterday’s mass.

About 50 policemen on the island and 500 officers on the pier at the
shore of the lake from where boats brought the Armenians to Akdamar
provided security. There were no reports of disturbances.

But participants of the church service were acutely aware that one
mass alone will not be enough to ensure reconciliation. `One flower
does not mean it’s summer,’ said Dr Boyacan, the cardiologist from
Syria. `This is one flower.’

From: A. Papazian

Hurriyet Daily News, Turkey
Sept 19 2010

Hrant for ever

Sunday, September 19, 2010
JOOST LAGENDIJK

Last week there was no escape. Hrant Dink dominated the
post-referendum news. First, the European Court of Human Rights, or
ECHR, delivered its damning verdict in the Dink versus Turkey case.
The same day, Tuba Çandar presented her book `Hrant’ and one day
later, on Sept. 15, his family and friends met to celebrate his
birthday and to witness the presentation of the 2010 International
Hrant Dink Awards.

The award ceremony was impressive, for several reasons. Together with
Jan. 19, the day he was killed, it has become one of the two moments
each year to commemorate his murder in 2007. Of course there was
sadness, in the minds of those present, in the genes of the meeting.
Sorrow about the loss of this remarkable person and frustration
because of the fact that his ongoing murder trial seems to be leading
nowhere. At the same time, there is the conviction that he will not be
forgotten and the determination to preserve the spirit of his fights
for ideals and his capacity to encourage others. This year was the
second time that the awards were presented. The domestic price went to
the movement of conscientious objectors in Turkey, a small but growing
organization of people who refuse to serve in the Turkish army. Faced
with persecution, conviction and torture, fighting an uphill struggle
for better treatment and new regulations for conscientious objectors.
The second award winner was Baltasar Garzon, the Spanish judge who
became famous around the world because of his efforts to bring the
Chilean junta leader Pinochet and Argentine military officers
responsible for the killing of thousands of civilians during the
1976-1983 dictatorship to court. After he initiated an investigation
into crimes committed during the Franco regime in Spain, a case was
opened against him and at the moment he is still suspended from his
duties. Garzon is a living example of the many courageous people
around the globe who take personal risks to work for a better world.
The awards are there to show that they are not alone and to motivate
everyone to fight for their ideals, using the language of peace.

That is exactly what Hrant was so good at. One is reminded of that
special quality when reading Tuba Çandar’s book. The author has not
tried to write a classic biography. What she did was gather hundreds
of recollections and impressions from people who knew Hrant and
combine them with fragments from articles and speeches by Hrant
himself. The result is a rich mosaic that superbly manages to bring to
life the many facets of Hrant: from the leftist, activist and defender
of Armenian rights to the tender friend and the haunted citizen.

The many mistakes made by the Turkish state in dealing with Hrant were
all unveiled in the ECHR judgment. Turkey was found guilty on all
counts, which includes violation of `the right to life’ and freedom of
expression. The court also found that Turkey has not managed to
investigate and prosecute those responsible for these failures, a
breach of duties that continues till this day because of the way the
case against Hrant’s murderers has been mishandled. In fact, the ECHR
has ordered Turkey to carry out a new and effective investigation into
the role of state officials connected with the case. That is good news
for the Dink family and their lawyers, who almost lost faith in the
possibility of upholding the law.

The Turkish state will pay financial compensation. But that should
only be the start of a fundamental revision of policy that should,
first and foremost, aim to remove the obstacles standing in the way of
trying all those responsible for Hrant’s murder. In the long run
though, this is not enough. The ideology that led Turkish courts to
deliberately distort Hrant’s statements, thereby making him a target
for ultranationalist groups, has to be skipped from the books and the
minds of the Turkish judiciary. The same goes for all those articles
restricting freedom of expression that still exist in several laws.
Only by carrying out these vital reforms, will the Turkish state be
able to comply with the legal obligations coming from Europe and with
the moral imperatives related to Hrant’s death.

The 2010 awards show that Hrant’s spirit is alive in the actions of
others, all around the world, and in the minds of those who worked
with him. Let’s hope last week’s events will also lead to the
redrafting of the state policies that victimized Hrant and so many
others in Turkey. Only then will his legacy be complete.

From: A. Papazian

Los Angeles Times
Sept 19 2010

Armenians worship in eastern Turkey, and for some it’s a bittersweet moment

Hundreds attend a service at the Armenian Church of the Holy Cross,
the first held there since 1915, when a wave of violence largely
destroyed one of the largest Christian communities in the Middle East.

Reporting from Akdamar Island, Turkey, and Beirut – A Sunday service
at a historic church in eastern Turkey underscored both the desire for
reconciliation between Turks and Armenians and the hurdles that remain
nearly a century after a violent massacre of Armenians.

It was the first service held in the 1,100-year-old Armenian Church of
the Holy Cross since 1915, when a wave of violence largely destroyed
one of the largest Christian communities in the Middle East.

Many Armenians in the diaspora and the neighboring republic of Armenia
boycotted and denounced Sunday’s service on Akdamar Island after
Turkish authorities did not allow a cross to be raised on the dome of
the church, allowing it to be placed on the church grounds nearby
instead.

Still, hundreds of Armenian pilgrims attended, many coming from the
relatively large Armenian community in Istanbul, Turkey’s main city,
but also from Iran, Germany, France and from as far away as the United
States. They flooded local hotels and traversed Lake Van by boat to
get to the site as they sang hymns.

“There is a village far, far away,” one group sang. “It’s my village
even though I never go or I haven’t seen it.”

Most visited the small church for a few minutes and watched the
ceremony via giant television screens set up in the gardens outside.

“I feel bittersweet about being here, because I grew up hearing about
the life in Van from my parents,” said Paul Shahinian, a 58-year-old
visiting from New Jersey. “I always had images in my head about Van. I
never imagined I could come here because Turkey didn’t welcome
Armenians.”

The church, surrounded by verdant mountains and hills, is decorated on
the outside with carvings of different animals such as peacocks, goats
and owls, which are common in Armenian iconography. Painted figures
inside are meant to represent the heavens.

“This church, which is a valuable piece of art, is a cultural monument
that belongs to the whole of humanity,” Archbishop Aram Atesyan of the
Armenian Patriarchate of Turkey said during a two-hour service he led,
according to Turkey’s semi-official Anatolia News Agency.

The 8-year-old government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has
strived to heal the wounds of the past by reaching out to Armenians in
Turkey and abroad in an attempt to bolster its international
reputation and smooth out obstacles to possible Turkish entrance into
the European Union. In 2005, Turkey began a $1.5-million restoration
of the church, opening it as a museum in 2007. It will host an annual
religious service from now on.

Some critics in both Turkey and among Armenians have denounced the
handling of the church opening as an attempt by Turks to whitewash a
violent history. But others describe the Sunday’ event as an important
gesture by an activist Turkish government that appears more ready and
able than previous political elites to address the country’s domestic
and international sore spots.

But attempts at reconciliation between Armenians and Turks have often
faltered, as much over misunderstandings of gestures as substantive
differences, the latter including Turkey’s refusal to abide by the
widely accepted description of the killings as genocide.

The cross controversy underscores the sensitivity of relations between
Turks and Armenians, even over relatively minor matters. Turkish
officials blamed the church’s Italian architect, saying the dome could
not handle the 440-pound cross. The provincial governor of Van has
promised that a cross would be mounted on the church within six weeks.

But many Armenians suspect continued chauvinism by Turks, who are
governed by a political party that has roots in the country’s Islamist
movements. “The cross wasn’t there because of the fears of the
governments,” said Rafi Altunkeser, a 40-year-old Armenian Turk
visiting from Istanbul.

But other Armenians called for reconciliation. Harry Parsekian, a
Boston resident, said his family originally hailed from eastern Turkey
but was driven out. He first returned to the Van region in 1985 and
has since returned many times.

“When I was young I never imagined I would have Turkish friends,” said
Parsekian. “But I do have really good Turkish friends now. And I
believe this is a good step for the Armenians and Turks.”

,0,7533213.story

From: A. Papazian

news.am, Armenia
Sept 19 2010

Turkish expert: The cross should have been erected right after the
reconstruction

September 19, 2010 | 19:32

Armenia and Turkey have politicized the issue of erecting the cross on
the Surb Khach Church, says the architect and restoration expert
Mildanoglu Zakaria, who took part in the reconstruction of the
historic church on the island of Akhtamar. Nnevertheless, the
authorization of a religious service is a huge breakthrough, stated
Mildanoglu in an interview with the Turkish edition of H?Ã?¼rriyet Daily
News & Economic Review.

He also noted that the debate about the issue of the cross should not
detract from the rare religious service in the church. ?«I have always
said that the cross should not be used in politics. The cross should
have been erected on the dome after the reconstruction, but this issue
has been so politicized by both sides, it has resulted in disputes?», –
said the Turk sadly.

It is worth mentioning that a group of Armenians raised wooden crosses
during the liturgy in protest to this fact.

The September 19 liturgy in the Surb Khach Church is the first in 100
years, but only the Armenian Patriarchate of Constantinople is
participating in the liturgy. The other three representatives of
Armenian Holy Church; The Holy See of Echmiadzin, the Armenian
Patriarchate of Jerusalem and the Holy See of Cilicia, refused to take
part in the liturgy. Many Armenian public figures turned down their
personal invitations from theTurkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip
Erdo?Ä?an as well.

The Surb Khach (Holy Cross) church of Akhtamar can not be considered
to have been fully restored until a cross is erected on the dome
stated various public figures.

From: A. Papazian

EurasiaNet, NY
Sept 19 2010

Turkey Allows Mass in Armenian Church for First Time in 95 Years

September 19, 2010 – 2:03pm, by Yigal Schleifer

As an Armenian growing up in Basra, Iraq, Vanuhi Ohannesian was always
hearing about eastern Turkey’s Lake Van region, her grandparents’
birthplace and the place after which she is named.

Ohannesian’s grandparents were forced to leave the lakeside city of
Van in 1915, when the Ottoman authorities drove out the region’s
ethnic Armenians; her father was born during the family’s trek from
Van to safety in Iraq.

`My father died two years ago and was always telling me to come to
Van. He said this was our motherland,’ said 68-year-old Ohannesian,
who today lives in Los Angeles.

Some 95 years after her grandparents’ flight from Turkey, Ohannesian
finds herself standing beside one of the Armenians’ most sacred sites,
the 1,089-year-old church on Lake Van’s Akdamar Island. Closed since
1915, the island church was restored by the Turkish authorities
between 2005 and 2007 and reopened as a museum.

On September 19, the authorities allowed a historic mass to be held on
Akdamar, an event that drew several thousand visitors to the island,
including many Armenians from abroad, such as Ohannesian, who had
never been to Turkey before.

`I never believed I would be coming here,’ said Ohannesian, standing
on a small hill that overlooks the church and holding a small bottle
filled with lake water which she plans to bring back to Los Angeles
and place at her father’s grave. `We believed people didn’t change,
that if they did something once, they would do it again.’

With Sunday’s service and the promise from Turkish officials that
similar services will be held in the future, the question many have is
if the church’s one-day opening represents a true breakthrough in
terms of Turkey’s willingness to confront its past or if the event was
little more than a glorified public relations event.

Cengiz Aktar, director of the European Studies Department at
Istanbul’s Bahcesehir University, says the event may have been
symbolic, but it also represents a deeper, more encouraging dynamic.

`It’s part of a slow but steady process of normalization regarding the
non-Muslim minorities in Turkey and the glorious past of coexistence
of religions in this land that was shattered by the emergence of the
nation state,’ said Aktar, who is active in civil society
Turkish-Armenian reconciliation efforts.

`At the end of the day, there is a reality that is unearthed,’ he
continued. `This is what should prevail. At the end of the day, we are
rediscovering the Armenian past in this region.’

The small church, known in Armenian as Surp Khach (Holy Cross), stands
on a high hill overlooking the sparkling blue waters of Lake Van.

Standing at the front of a boat heading towards Akdamar, Pakrat
Estukian, an editor with the Turkish-Armenian Agos newspaper,
described the day as `very emotional.’

`There were some 2,000 Armenian churches in Turkey before 1915 and so
many have disappeared,’ commented the mustachioed, 57-year-old
Estukyan. `This is the first one rebuilt by the Turkish Republic. This
is important.’

Archbishop Aram Atesian of the Armenian Patriarchate in Istanbul led
the two-hour mass. With room for only some 50 congregants inside the
church, the mass was broadcast outside on a large television screen.
Several priests came outside at one point to offer the gathered
faithful communion.

Standing in front of the church, Harvey Parsekian, an Armenian from
Boston whose parents were born in central Turkey, expressed a mix of
joy and skepticism.

`This is just symbolic. Let’s see what happens after this,’ Parsekian
said. `I wouldn’t like this to only be a propaganda tool for Turkey.
Let there be sincerity behind what this is about.’

The event, meanwhile, was not without controversy. Although a cross
had been prepared for the church’s roof, local officials, claiming
they lacked the proper equipment to lift the cross up to the roof,
balked at putting it up. It appeared that Turkish officials were also
concerned about creating the impression that the church was being
officially consecrated.

The failure to place the cross on the church prompted several groups
of Diaspora Armenians and religious officials from Armenia to cancel
their visits to the service. [For details, see the EurasiaNet.org
archive.]

But Aris Nalci, another Agos editor, warns against letting the cross
controversy and the politics surrounding it from obscuring the event’s
significance.

`This is a very important step for this city and the people living in
the city,’ said Nalci, who came early to Van to help publish a special
edition newspaper in Armenian called `Van Time,’ the first
Armenian-language newspaper to be printed in the city since 1915.

`Five years ago, you couldn’t imagine that a newspaper in Armenian
would be published in Van. Previously people here would tell me not to
say that I’m Armenian. Now people here are proud to say they have an
Armenian friend,’ he recounted.

`This is a big opportunity. It’s a big step for the Van people,’ Nalci added.

Indeed, a large number of the visitors to the island on Sunday were
curious Muslim locals, who sat around the church’s courtyard listening
as the service was played over loudspeakers.

`These are our friends, our neighbors,’ commented Erdal Dursun, a high
school principal from Van who came to the island with his wife and two
children. `The history here is difficult, but life moves on. Today is
a happy event.’

As the cross crisis might have showed, though, the one-day opening of
the church might not be enough to help start a thaw in the now frozen
reconciliation process between Turkey and Armenia. [For details, see
the EurasiaNet.org archive.]

Still, noted Bahcesehir’s Aktar, the significance of the church
service should not be underestimated.

`The memory of the Armenians’ presence here is coming back and if
official action helps bring that memory back, all the better,’ he
said.

Editor’s note: Yigal Schleifer is a freelance reporter and
photojournalist based in Istanbul.

From: A. Papazian

EurasiaNet, NY
Sept 19 2010

Thousands Attend Historic Mass at Church in Turkey
September 19, 2010 – 2:46pm, by Yigal Schleifer

For the first time in 95 years, Turkey allows several thousand
Christian worshipers, including many Armenians from abroad, to attend
a historic mass at the 1,089-year-old church on Lake Van’s Akdamar
Island in eastern Turkey. Closed since 1915, Holy Cross Church was
restored by the Turkish authorities between 2005 and 2007 and reopened
as a museum.

Archbishop Aram Atesian of the Armenian Patriarchate in Istanbul led
the two-hour mass. With room for only some 50 congregants inside the
church, the mass was broadcast outside on a large television screen.
Several priests came outside at one point to offer the gathered
faithful communion.

Editor’s Note: Yigal Schleifer is a freelance reporter and
photojournalist based in Istanbul.

Watch Akhtamar photos at

From: A. Papazian

Wall Street Journal , NY
Sept 19 2010

Armenian Church In Turkey Reopens To Worship

By Joe Parkinson
Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES

AKDAMAR ISLAND, Turkey (Dow Jones)–Turkey allowed Armenians to
worship at a symbolic but politically sensitive church here for the
first time since the collapse of the Ottoman Empire on Sunday, in a
service hailed by Turkish officials as a sign of growing tolerance for
religious minorities, but which underscored the lingering distrust
between Ankara and Yerevan.

The emotional two-hour mass at the Church of the Holy Cross–an iconic
landmark on Akdamar island in the turquoise waters of Lake Van in
Turkey’s poverty-stricken southeast region–was attended by about
1,000 people. But that was a fraction of the 5,000 visitors expected,
as a partial Armenian boycott saw thousands cancel their trips after
Turkish authorities refused to display a 440-pound cross on the
church’s roof, claiming it was too heavy and could damage the
structure. The 16.5-foot-tall cross instead was displayed next to the
belltower of the church.

Worshippers, the vast majority from the Armenian diaspora community,
packed into the small red-stone church or watched Orthodox priests
deliver the first liturgy there in almost 100 years on big-screen
televisions specially erected for the event. Some pilgrims, overcome
with emotion, held wooden crosses aloft as they prayed. Others
exchanged stories about the ancient Armenian civilization that once
existed in Turkey but was almost erased in 1915 in what many regard as
genocide. Turkey strongly denies that a genocide took place,
describing the killings as the tragic result of a civil war in which
all sides suffered.

Eighty year-old Lebanese Armenian Victoria Tutunjian, whose parents
fled to Beirut to escape those killings, said she “always hoped but
never imagined” she could come to pray here. “I’m so happy this
ceremony is taking place and I will come here every year until the day
I die. But Turks are still my enemy, and coming here and walking on
this soil is my revenge,” she said, clutching a small Armenian flag.

Other Turks and Armenians here were more positive about the service’s
significance. “This is a great day for all Armenians; I’m confident
things will start to change now,” said Tigran Abrahamian, a 45-year
old industrial engineer from Istanbul, who is married to a Turk and
brought his family to the service. Some 50,000 Armenians live in
Turkey.

Still, Muslim Turkey and Christian Armenia remain bitterly divided
over their troubled history. The border between them remains closed
despite U.S.-brokered peace accords signed last year.

For Armenians across the world, the Church of the Holy Cross,
abandoned in 1915 and reopened as a museum after a $1.5 million
restoration in 2007, has become symbolic of the deportation and
killings at the hands of Ottoman forces. The controversy over the
church’s cross underlines the mistrust that exists between the
neighbors. In Yerevan on Sunday, 1,500 people attended an alternative
religious service at a genocide memorial that denounced the Akdamar
service as a publicity stunt.

“Our mission for today was to show that the Turkish government should
not use our heritage as a propaganda tool to pretend that they are
tolerant,” said Hayk Demoyan, director of Yerevan’s Genocide Museum,
in a telephone interview after he addressed the crowds.

Turkish Culture and Tourism Minister Ertugrul Gunay said that the
government had agreed to the Armenian religious service in good faith
and that nationalists on both sides were exploiting the event for
political purposes.

Sunday’s service was the second of two special church openings
recently permitted by the Turkish government after Ankara in August
allowed Christians to pray at a Greek Orthodox monastery in Sumela, in
the Black Sea region, for the first time since the country’s creation.

Often criticized for its treatment of Christian minorities, Ankara has
promoted the services as proof of its growing commitment to religious
tolerance. Critics say the tightly controlled services are a carefully
choreographed public-relations campaign designed to boost Turkey’s
prospects of joining the European Union, for which it is a candidate.

“Yes, this is a PR stunt by the Turkish government to show it is being
respectful to its minorities … but, frankly, if it means that Turkey
and Armenia can move closer towards resolving their differences, then
who cares,” said Ara Sarafian, director of the Gomidas Institute, a
London-based research organization.

Local businesses in the region of Van are supportive of improved
relations, hoping religious tourists would help the region profit.
Gaye Akay, a hotelier born in Van but based in Ankara, is planning to
open the region’s first five-star hotel next year. “We think this is
the beginning of something really special,” she said. “More Armenians
and international tourists will start coming here and spending their
dollars.

Negotiations to open the border between Turkey and Armenia went into
deep freeze, as neither side ratified a deal outlined last year and
both sides accused the other of setting additional conditions.

From: A. Papazian